English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Cerberus

12:52 AM

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 That's because I'm using Android, d'oh.

@Mitch My point is that the only state malware found on American computers is from China and possibly Russia.

@MattЭллен Silence!!

Kabir

1:09 AM

Hi @Cerberus

Cerberus

Hello.

KitFox

room topic changed to English Language & Usage: All your language are belong to us. (no tags)

Robusto

2:38 AM

Seriously?

Mitch

@Cerberus Sure. It does seem weird that the US would put spyware on EU computers given that as you put it we're 'allies' and 'friends'.

cornbread ninja 麵包忍者

3:12 AM

@Matt thanks again for your support!

@Robusto heh.

Your toe! :(

Cerberus

3:30 AM

@Mitch Right. I mean, in a way I can understand why you would spy even on allies, but spreading a huge virus across countless computers of private companies and individuals in those allied countries is a bit bleh.

Mitch

3:57 AM

@Cerberus All I'm getting at is that I'm tired of it all. I just expect everyone is spying on everyone else, even friends on other friends just because you never know if your friend is spying on the enemies within well enough.

curls up in corner

near the heater is not so bad

Robusto

@cornbreadninja麵包忍者 Meh, it's not that bad. I can still ride my bike.

Mitch

Ooh, I have a word! 'serendipitous'. Or how about 'gormless'? Wait, you meant a word that fits that sentence? — Mitch 1 min ago

Cerberus

4:15 AM

@Mitch Even on your ally's academics, private companies, members of parliament? By installing malware on thousands of computers across the entire country?

Still, do you think, say, England or Germany has installed malware and is actively wiretapping American professors at Harvard and Congressmen?

Obama?

Of course we cannot exclude the possibility...

Jasper Loy

6:09 AM

@Kabir Yes, it is very ungrammatical.

Mitch

12:45 PM

If you made a TL;DR, it would have to have its own TL;DR — Mitch 37 secs ago

In America, we don't need tea-towels, because when we serve tea, we don't spill it all everywhere like some three-thumbed shopkeeper. — Mitch 16 secs ago

Matt Эллен

You don't need tea towels because you don't clear up your own messes

Mitch

Here's a tea-towel, thanks for taking care of that, Mary.

Wait...here's a better one: Look, man, no one asked us to clean up Afghanistan.

skullpatrol

Now, now guys let's not fight over spelt tea...

Mitch

The US is the tea-towel of the world. That's pretty much the patriotic feeling here.

The proper way to serve it is you pout the spelt in your tea, not the other way round.

skullpatrol

Patriotism is, in general, just another way for the rich to keep the poor occupied.

Mitch

1:01 PM

No editing on my phone!! It's stuck like that forever

@skullpatrol wraps self in flag

it's the only blanket I have

skullpatrol

Isn't that how they bury soldiers?

Mitch

Oh. Really? They put one on top of the coffin I think.

skullpatrol

Thanks for giving your life for your country, here have a flag.

Mitch

!!! Shit that's depressing

The crying wife gets it.

skullpatrol

I call it the way I see it.

sorry

Cerberus

1:05 PM

Hello.

Mitch

Hey

skullpatrol

hi

Cerberus

I see the important subject has finally been raised?

Mitch

We were discussing how great it is to be alive.

Cerberus

No, tea-towels.

Mitch

1:06 PM

And how much the alternative sicks

Cerberus

I didn't even know what tea-towels were...

Mitch

We still are discussing tea towels, right?

Matt Эллен

@Mitch Everywhere else thinks you're the teaspoon

Mitch

What is it were really talking about when we talk about things?

It's teatowels

Matt Эллен

teat owls?

I'm not sure I want to see one of those

Mitch

1:08 PM

@MattЭллен gobsmacked how dare you!!

Matt Эллен

How dare you?!

skullpatrol

they take with a shovel and give with a teaspoon

Cerberus

Very confusing, those tea towels.

Mitch

@skullpatrol two please, no cream.

yes, sugar, not splenda.

skullpatrol

splenda does not taste spendid

Mitch

1:16 PM

Of all the non-sugar sweeteners, it's the least revolting.

It's basically levulose, right?

Matt Эллен

I can't tell the difference between coke and coke life

skullpatrol

one is alive?

Mitch

left handed sugar? fits the taste receptors for dextrose, but doesn't get metabolized?

Matt Эллен

but coke life is a mix of sugar and steve

Mitch

I never thought I would admit this but Steve is pretty good, except for that weird aftertaste.

Matt Эллен

1:17 PM

apparently Steve tastes sweeter than sugar

Mitch

I think you meant his sister, Stevia.

Matt Эллен

oh!, right, right. I always mix them up

skullpatrol

-_-

Matt Эллен

> The active compounds of stevia are steviol glycosides (mainly stevioside and rebaudioside), which have up to 150 times the sweetness of sugar

Mitch

Holy crap! What are the inactive ones? Those are the ones you have to worry about.

Just wait until they're called into service.

I feel silly. We have these towels in our kitchen, you know, to clean up, etc. All along they must have been tea towels.

I should probably wash them more often then.

Matt Эллен

1:27 PM

probably

Mitch

the tone in your voice when you say that makes me suspicious.

You're hiding a tea-towel behind your back. Am I right?

authorities say that Splenda has more in common with DDT than with food.

So it tastes sweet and keeps away bugs.

Matt Эллен

woo!

Robusto

1:47 PM

@Mitch Have you tried it for keeping away bugs?

Mitch

@Robusto ...maybe?

I've never seen bugs around those packets. No live ones anyway. Maybe that means it works?

Robusto

Iced tea with Lyme disease?

Mitch

Even better, the Lyme disease is cured as you drink it!

Robusto

Not cured. Meats are cured. Tea is brewed.

Mitch

Brewed meat is all the rage.

Robusto

1:52 PM

Meat with brewskies is all the rage. Beer 'n' brats. You could look it up.

Mitch

looks it up

Nothing about tea-towels there. disappoint

Robusto

If you need a towel you're drinking it wrong.

Mitch

Hey, tea is steeped. If you brew it, it gets all gamey.

@Robusto My point exactly. Tell that to the Britishers

Robusto

@Mitch "steep some tea" gets no love at all on NGram search, but "brew some tea" certainly does. QED

Mitch

@Robusto I think you just made your own point about how terrible nGrams is. People shouldn't be saying that.

Robusto

2:00 PM

NGrams are for entertainment purposes only. Please, no wagering.

Matt Эллен

steep the leave to brew the tea

Robusto

What about the towels?

Matt Эллен

use them to dry your dishes

Robusto

Should you steep your dishes or just brew them?

Also, what about cups?

Matt Эллен

steep them in warm soapy water for as long as necessary

Robusto

2:04 PM

Are steep and step the same word? Explain. Also, what about steed and steer?

Matt Эллен

Tea towels are not dependent on cup size

Robusto

@MattЭллен Well, technically they are, since no men I know use tea towels.

Matt Эллен

I use tea towels

Robusto

I rest my case.

^)^

Couldn't resist.

Matt Эллен

I suppose I am an orc

Robusto

2:06 PM

I must play more Dragon Age: Inquisition today.

It's nice being off from work.

Matt Эллен

Holiday?

Robusto

I took Thanksgiving week off.

Matt Эллен

nice

skullpatrol

must be

Robusto

Yeah. Stayed up late, got up late, nothing to do but whatever I feel like.

And just now I'm feeling like having a nice bike ride.

For tomorrow it snows. :(

Matt Эллен

2:11 PM

nooo

I've been chuckling at the folks scraping frost of their windscreens, but if the roads get icy, I'm so screwed.

Andrew Leach

Whereas some of us have a set of winter tyres.

Robusto

I have a wifi connection for when it snows and I have to work.

Matt Эллен

@AndrewLeach I could tape drawing pins to my tyres...

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@MattЭллен What kind of bike do you have? I used to have a "mountain" bike with 1" wide tires and it was fine in snow and icy weather

well, "fine"

Robusto

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 He doesn't understand inches. He's metric.

Matt Эллен

2:26 PM

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I have a hybrid with slick tyres. I could easily get more appropriate tyres if I need to. I even have a wheel from my previous bike with a tyre with decent grip

Andrew Leach

@MattЭллен Winter tyres have more sipes for better water dispersal and more grip. They're not knobbly or snow-chained.

Matt Эллен

@AndrewLeach ah. interesting

"No, it's not radioactive. It's only radioactive when mumble mumble" — Overheard at customer support.

2

Mitch

2:50 PM

@MattЭллен mmm.... soap tea.

No need for clean up.

would solve the tea-towel problem.

for men.

Matt Эллен

3:06 PM

foremen?

for foremen?
for four men?
for four foremen?
four men?
four foremen?
four for men?
four for foremen?

SmokeDetector

3:22 PM

[ SmokeDetector ] Offensive title detected: Clean, concise, snappy synonym for 'fucking awesome' by Kenny LJ on english.stackexchange.com

Robusto

4:02 PM

Average, ordinary, mundane, unexceptional, run-of-the-mill—oh, wait, you don't want to tell the truth. — Robusto 14 secs ago

user116848

5:05 PM

Yello!

oerkelens

Re!

Orang!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

5:27 PM

@Cerberus I finally installed Android L. That whole "betrayal of trust" due to the change in how quiet mode works is WAY overblown. Yes it's different than before but the differences are right there in your face. It's trivially easy to make your phone not ring or buzz for a short time or at specific times.

Cerberus

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 All right, if you know what to expect, you can abuse Priority Mode to get the old, desired behaviour.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

No, you can USE priority mode to achieve exactly what it's meant to achieve

Cerberus

However, you still cannot use the volume button to silence your phone as normal.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

There are three modes: "none", "priority", "all"

Cerberus

No, because silencing is what what PM is meant for.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

5:28 PM

When you hit "volume down" it offers you the choices of the three modes right there on the volume slider

Cerberus

Priority is meant for only allowing e.g. your mother and your top-secret e-mail account to wake you up.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

If you are at a memorial service or whatever your contrived example was, just pick "none"

Cerberus

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Not the same thing. I use only my volume key.

In my pocket.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus You have to unlock the phone at least.

Cerberus

I happened to get a chance to examine L on my friend's phone yesterday.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I do not.

Only the screen needs to be on.

Maybe it's different if you have a PIN (I don't).

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

5:30 PM

@Cerberus yes, it is different.

Cerberus

Maybe people don't use a PIN.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

So the "betrayal of trust" you spoke of was that the people who don't use a pin and rely on silencing their phone blindly may be surprised to discover that the feature works slightly differently now.

Cerberus

At any rate, you would need to know that it had changed and configured Priority Mode to suit your needs (and rule out ever using the main function of PM) in order to prevent the memorial-service scenario. What if you didn't read Android Police, just tapped yes when it asked to update?

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 That's only one half. The other half is my previous line ^.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I don't understand at all why you think the memorial service scenario is somehow not easily handled by just picking "none" instead of "priority"?

@Cerberus Anyone who looks at the screen while setting the volume down will notice the change right away. They can just click "none" right then and there.

Assuming the first time they ever need to use this feature is when they're standing up on the altar about to deliver their vows, or something.

In fact you can now tell it to be completely silent for a specified duration, which prevents the scenario where you FORGET your phone is on silent and then miss calls.

Cerberus

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I suppose you could press "none", but what if you were in a hurry and didn't really get what the menu was about? You would keep pressing volume down and think your phone was broken.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

5:35 PM

@Cerberus No, it's abundantly clear that the feature has changed. Maybe you wouldn't know what to do, but why would you think it was broken?

Cerberus

Because pressing volume down again didn't work?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

It's abundantly clear the feature has changed.

It's right there in your face

Cerberus

I really don't understand why they have removed pressing volume down to silence. It's always been that way and it's very convenient.

I use it every day.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 But you may not even be looking at your phone.

You just don't change such an important feature all of a sudden!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I wish they would remove the feature where the volume knobs can even adjust the ringer volume at all.

I never, ever want to do that.

Cerberus

Why not?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

5:37 PM

Just let me turn silent mode on and off.

I hate that the volume knob controls the ringer.

Cerberus

A physical button is convenient, especially for very important things you want to make sure respond well when you're not or half looking.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I hate that I can't turn the volume down (easily) for a game or video until the app starts playing.

Cerberus

I can.

Probably because of CM.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus well, then, get an iPhone. It has a physical mute button.

Cerberus

I will!!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

5:38 PM

@Cerberus yes, it's different on CM.

Cerberus

stamps off

And I also hate that they have taken away the notification ticker!

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus I didn't notice that.

Cerberus

> Another reason for why the new heads-up notifications are problematic is that they appear on the same place as the action bar, so you might click on them by accident, when trying to reach the action bar items.
if the notification also has action items, you might even click them...

> These new popups notifications are great for high priority notifications like calls and alarms. But for anything that didn't previously warrant a full screen notification they are simply too obtrusive. For normal notifications the old ticker was much, much better.

I agree with this. It seems to obvious: why didn't Google test this with real people??

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

I'm not sure how much I like the new lock screen. It has an easy way to get to the dialer, but the "swipe right to unlock" gesture that's been there since gods know when is now broken. THAT is an annoyance.

Cerberus

Huh?

How is it broken?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

5:40 PM

The new unlock gesture is SWIPE UP

Cerberus

Huh?

What happens when you swipe right?

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

swipe right opens the dialer

swipe left opens the camera

Cerberus

sighs

Why??

Google is in some ways as crazy as Microsoft.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

yeah I dunno. That is going to annoy me a lot, I think.

Esp since swipe-up doesn't unlock on older phones

Cerberus

They change things that 90% of their users could immediately tell them they wouldn't like. It is unnecessary yet forces them to annoyingly change their routine (only if the advantage is huge could it be worth it, but it's not).

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I think most non-stock phones unlock by swiping in any direction.

Jasper Loy

5:42 PM

It is interesting that all these years I emailed many people but not @Mr.ShinyandNew安宇, lol.

Cerberus

Perhaps you didn't press the Send button hard enough.

Mr. Shiny and New 安宇

@Cerberus Well, the swipe left to take a photo is an improvement over the old way using the lock-screen widgets

those never worked well

well, my Tasker task for automatically unlocking when I'm connected to certain wifi points still works

the similar built-in feature only works with bluetooth and nfc

Cerberus

Huh, really?

The built-in feature doesn't work with Wifi??

That's crazy.

It is everyone's primary use for the function.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I agree that lockscreen widgets never worked well, they only activated in my pocket. Especially the camera widget has several times woken up my phone in my pocket and drained it within the hour.

Until I turned it off.

@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I have that in CM. In theory, it's useful. But somehow I never got used to using it.

Also because the option is invisible until you hold down the lock button.

But let is keep East, NE, and SE as the directions that simply unlock the phone, as we are used to.

Matt Эллен

6:21 PM

@Cerberus This swipe thing affected my tablet. before I could swipe any which way, now it's just up. Kinda annoying, since there aren't other features like on a phone

Cerberus

@MattЭллен Ah, you got L on your N7?

I wonder why so many people update immediately, even though they are aware some things may change for the worse.

Matt Эллен

@Cerberus yeah.

c2f 34

93.2°F

Cerberus

Oh?

A script?

That's handy.

So handy wie ein Handy.

Matt Эллен

6:37 PM

yes! a script. my plan for the evening is to make it reply to the asker. after dinner, though

Cerberus

6:51 PM

Ah, in here.

I am trying to create a Greasemonkey script (or userstyle) that adds a blank button or area to every page. My goal is to have something to safely emulate a mouse click on, in order to restore keyboard focus to the main page.

Otherwise, button presses like Home may be stolen by text boxes or Flash objects.

Cerberus

7:10 PM

By the way, if you take gaming seriously, you will install this at home, from 1:18 onwards: tweakers.net/video/9732/…

Mitch

@Cerberus Your mobi got stuck in my beamer

Cerberus

@Mitch Leider hab ich keine Mobi.

Mitch

@MattЭллен What's the basic plot? Who is going to play the character that is really you? Brad Pitt?

Cerberus

By the way, did you know they "abbreviate" trendy words on -o in French?

Do you know what a text message is? A texto!

A pen? A stylo!

Mitch

@Cerberus For real? All this Nexus/iPhone/Android talk and nothing?

Andrew Leach

7:12 PM

Pen was stylo when I was at school forty years ago. Hardly trendy.

Mitch

@Cerberus a restraining order...an Abso!

A stomach restraining order... a McDo!!

@AndrewLeach Trendy... trendo!!

Cerberus

(Actually, it appears stylo is an older word.)

@AndrewLeach Jinx.

@Mitch Haha for example!

Mitch

A chocolaty treat, Am style... a Ho Ho!!

@Cerberus No, nobody says it that way.

Cerberus

@Mitch We actually say McDo when we are talking about a McDonald's in pseudo-French!

Not sure whether it's authentic.

@Mitch But they should!

Mitch

@Cerberus I'm pretty sure les gosses these days say McDo. It's grating.

@Cerberus I already do, ha ha, but for the rest, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make them laugh.

Cerberus

7:15 PM

@Mitch Haha OK. I am glad we are authentically grating.

@Mitch Laugh! NOW!!

Mitch

@Cerberus The french too

@Cerberus clears throat ha?

Cerberus

@Mitch Well, they are so by definition.

@Mitch Thank you.

Mitch

@Cerberus Even moreso?

What is stylo short for?

Cerberus

Josep Joan Moreso

Josep Joan Moreso (Tortosa, Spain, 27 March 1959) graduated in Law from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (1983) where he also completed his PhD (1988), achieving high-class honours in both instances. He has held teaching posts at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (1988–1995); the Universitat de Girona (1996–2000) and the Universitat Pompeu Fabra (2000–2005). Rector of the Universitat Pompeu Fabra from May 2005 to June 2013. On October 2010, he was invested as doctor honoris causa of the Valparaíso University (Chile). == Academic career and research == Moreso’s primary area of investigation...

@Mitch Stylographe.

Mitch

o.

@Cerberus I'd prefer to see less of him.

Cerberus

7:17 PM

Lessso?

Lesssotho?

> Though frequent in informal writing, some arbiters of English usage[1][2][3] consider “moreso” an incorrect form of “more so”, sometimes citing the fact that in many cases the "so" is included tautologically, and the word “more” is all that is needed. "Moreso" appearing in print may be a typo in the form of an accidentally omitted space.

Those arbiters—or their voice on Wikipaedia—seem to be conflating two unrelated points.

Blue energy can be economically feasible at 8c/kWh.

Without subsidies!

If we build such installations everywhere along a certain Dutch dike, they can provide electricity for 500,000 households, day and night, without any pollution whatsoever.

Mitch

@Cerberus They also seem to be wrong in general.

Cerberus

If we use other dikes as well, even more energy can be made.

@Mitch No comment.

Mitch

@Cerberus what are zout, zoet, and brak? Brak looks like it is on the pollutiony side of things.

@Cerberus I take that as a positive sign of lack of commitment one way or the other.

Cerberus

@Mitch Salt, sweet, brackish.

@Mitch Mention ≠ mission.

Mitch

Is it a desalinization plant?

Cerberus

7:25 PM

No.

A power plant.

Mitch

@Cerberus That seems so full of meaning but I can't fathom it.

Cerberus

Comment ≠ commit.

Mitch

@Cerberus It -adds- salt to the water to get energy out?

@Cerberus Ohhhhh.

ha?

Cerberus

It combined salt and sweet water to create electricity, at a cost of ca. 8 cents/kWh, if the plant is sufficiently large (1 million m² of membranes).

Osmotic power

Osmotic power or salinity gradient power is the energy available from the difference in the salt concentration between seawater and river water. Two practical methods for this are reverse electrodialysis (RED) and pressure retarded osmosis (PRO). Both processes rely on osmosis with ion specific membranes. The key waste product is brackish water. This byproduct is the result of natural forces that are being harnessed: the flow of fresh water into seas that are made up of salt water. The method of generating power by pressure retarded osmosis was invented by Prof. Sidney Loeb in 1973 at the Ben-Gurion...

Mitch

@Cerberus hopefully they were going to be combined anyway.

Cerberus

7:27 PM

@Mitch They were not, but there is no harm in releasing brackish water into the sea. As rivers do.

Normally, the potential energy in contact between sweet river water and sea water goes to waste.

Mitch

I think we should hook up barge sized piezoelectric generators (converting linear eneergy into electric) to convert the movement of all the great ice sheets from melting underneath into icebergs. Then we can use your powerplants to convert the melting fresh water from those detached icecaps as they turnover with the oceans saltwater.

I'm going for irony. Not efficient electricity production.

Cerberus

Imagine how much energy that is, all those rivers on earth pumping sweet water into the sea every second and every aeon!

skullpatrol

whatever happened to windmills for power?

Cerberus

@Mitch Umm...

Mitch

@skullpatrol What? They're becoming ubiquitous!

Cerberus

7:29 PM

Is that cyclic?

Mitch

@Cerberus Ha! Made you think!

Cerberus

@skullpatrol We have tons of windmills, but they are fare more expensive per kWh! They are only feasible with subsidies.

@Mitch You did.

Mitch

@Cerberus Oh. really? Because they're so expensive to build and maintain?

Cerberus

Yes, especially maintenance.

Of course they are improving technologies constantly...

And it probably depends on the size and location of the operation, and on how you count. Perhaps it has become cost effective under certain circumstances.

Matt Эллен

@Mitch definitely Brad Pitttttt

Mitch

7:37 PM

@Cerberus depends on how windy it is?

@MattЭллен In the movie of Brad Pitt's life I'll be playing him.

Matt Эллен

@Mitch at snakes and ladders?

Mitch

In English food culture, there is no such thing as talking at the table after the meal is done. The food is so bad, one often leaves the table before finishing. — Mitch 12 secs ago

@MattЭллен Just snakes. That's how bad his life is.

Cerberus

@Mitch That is part of it.

Mitch

This is confusing: "Equivalent of “Excuse me” for “you're not in my way”? Pedestrian bump avoidance"... basically shouldn't you just not say anything?

"Excuse, person way across the room, I'm going to blink. So no worries!"

Matt Эллен

c2f 23

73.4°F

c2f 14

@MattЭллен 57.2°F

yeah!

done

Mitch

7:46 PM

what? is this notation for multidimensional chess?

Matt Эллен